SWBMAI member band (This is the) Squirrel Hunters played their debut show this past Sunday at the Roxbury Tavern in Roxbury, WI and will play this weekend at the Brooklyn Bluegrass Festival. This self described “traditional Bluegrass co-op” is based around Madison and includes members from other area Bluegrass bands: Bob Batyko and Lorie Docken, from the Sparetime Bluegrass Band; brothers Brian and Sean Ray, from the Brothers Ray; and Mr. Paul Kienitz, from the Nob Hill Boys.

From the band’s bio: “We make regular musical forays outside the protective walls of Bill Monroe, The Stanley Brothers and Flatt & Scruggs, but always with caution, and never without a long rifle.”

The band’s debut was capped by Tom, owner and proprieter at the Roxbury Tavern, cooking up a delicious squirrel stew for the boys (and Lorie). There are some pictures from the show including stew shots! There is also video of the event available on the band’s website and on YouTube… case in point:

For the past couple of weeks I’ve had the good fortune to be running around Australia with mandolinist Mike Compton. This was especially nice as I missed the last few weeks of snow and cold, and instead, was enjoying Australia’s summer of blue skies and 80˚ weather. I joined Mike onstage for a few numbers each night and was able capture a bit of video from the show in Margaret River, Australia. To say the trip was absolutely fantastic is an almost criminal understatement!

Denny was good enough to post some video of the Nob Hill Boys from their show at the Stoughton Opera House this past Friday. Fine work gents!

Liz Carroll and John Doyle will be performing Saturday, February 9, at Folklore Village, 7:30 p.m. Liz is an All-Ireland Champion fiddler and a National Hertiage Fellowship recipient. John, is one of the original members of the Irish ensemble Solas, as well as an occasional member of Tim O’Brien’s band. This show is highly recommend, as are reservations (it’s currently almost sold out).

Here is a close representation of the intro break to Fire Ball Mail as played by Earl Scruggs on the Foggy Mountain Banjo album.

Last week, it was my pleasure to play with the New Pioneers, sitting in for the unavoidably-detained Mr. Bruce King. A fine time was had by… well… at least me. As reported earlier, this is the band’s monthly show (2nd Thurs) down in Fort Atkinson, at the Cafe Carpe. As it turns out, and the reason I bring it up here, the ocasion was documented by DenWolf.

Here is a medium tempo demonstration of the quintessential flatpicking tune. This is based off Doc Watson’s original recording in the key of D (capo 2nd). Apart from Doc most people generally play the tune in the key of A.

A while back, I was perusing a few records over at Countysales.com. They have a buy 6 CDs, get a 7th one free deal so I went looking for something new for my freebie. As luck would have it, I chose The Legend of Clark Kessinger… lucky indeed.

Mr Kessinger is easily one of the finest fiddlers the world has ever known. These recordings were made shortly after he teamed up with guitarist Gene Meade and banjo player Wayne Hauser. Clark had recorded back in the 20s but was taking advantage of the folk rebirth of the 60s (thank you hippies).

I popped this record on during a practice session with The Brothers Ray & Paul. We all just about flipped! These guys are serious players. Brother Sean was blown away by Gene Meade’s guitar playing and with good reason… he’s an ANIMAL! Gene’s shotgun bass runs match perfectly with Clark’s highly aggressive attack. These boys’s the real deal!

As luck would also have it, YouTube has a clip of Clark and the Boys from the a Newport Festival (folk? 60s?)…

The immortal Carter Family classic, Wildwood Flower. A simple melody that lends itself well to crosspicking. If you’re unfamiliar with crosspicking it’s just a fancy word used to describe the process of simulating a banjo roll with a flatpick. In its simplest form the picking pattern generally starts with a downstroke and alternates from there. It gets a little more involved once you start branching out to multiple strings.

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Here’s a clip of the Chapmans playing “Losing Again” at this years Brooklyn Bluegrass Fest.